Of all the occupations in the United States, which has so few practitioners that if you got them all together — a possibility since there are only 310 of them — they’d comfortably fit in a middle-school auditorium? (Maybe not in those eighth grader-sized seats, but they could all be accommodated.)

Need a hint? They comprise one of the nine specialties recognized by the American Dental Association, specializing in the restoration of natural teeth or replacing missing teeth or oral structures with artificial devices, such as dentures. These would be prosthodontists.

The fun little statistical compilation that got posted last week has numbers for the biggest and smallest occupations. Biggest? Why that would be retail sales clerks whose 4.34 million workers represent 3.3% of America’s labor force. Followed by the 3.31 million cashiers, accounting for 2.5 percent of workers, and 2.94 million fast-food workers, servers, and food-prep folks, which are 2.3 percent. It appears whoever said someday we’ll be working for Walmart or McDonald’s may have been on to something.

Mapping Recruiting’s Tech

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Having now clarified why it is so difficult to hire prosthodontists or fabric menders, here’s help understanding who’s who in talent acquisition. Yeow!

If nothing else, you have to give Headhunter Labs credit for sticking its neck out on this one. Without breaking a sweat, I came up with 10 or 11 vendors not on the list. And I know what happens if you fail to mention a vendor: they call, write, or comment.

PS: Feel free to post your missing company in the comments below. And, good luck to the Labs guys there in NYC.

About the author

John was a newspaper reporter and editor until his geek gene lead him to launch his first website in 1994. Never a recruiter, he instead built online employment sites and sold advertising services to recruiters and employers. As VP of one large media operation, his employment revenue alone approached $2.5 million. Besides writing for ERE, John consults with digital content operations, focusing on the advertising side. And when he's not doing either, he can be found hiking in the California mountains or competing in canine agility events.